Shaved hair style scalp medical tattooing technique for treatment of advanced male pattern baldness patients

BACKGROUND: The most infallible approach to male pattern baldness (MPB) is hair transplantation in the thinning area in parallel to medical treatment to prevent further alopecia progression. For an individual with advanced stage hair loss, a megasession surgery is recommended to meet the high donor hair requirement. Yet a most effective therapeutic regimen for alopecia, hair transplantation inevitably has its advantages and disadvantages for it is done with the expense of donor hair sacrifice, intraoperative and postoperative pain, and unavoidable scars. Also, with poor donor condition, surgery may not even be an option. Nowadays, more patients with such limitations are undergoing shaved style scalp medical tattoo (SMT). OBJECTIVE: To assess the effectiveness of SMT technique for shaved hair style. METHODS AND MATERIALS: A total of 80 patients who were included in the study underwent SMT for shaved hair style between June 2014 and June 2017 and were followed for at least 6 months afterward. Patients and the surgeon completed a survey about donor and recipient site surgical results using a 5‐point Likert scale. RESULTS: The average satisfaction scores of patients and surgeon were 4.8 and 4.9, respectively. CONCLUSION: Shaved style SMT can be considered one of the most effective treatment methods for patients with advanced stage hair loss. LEVEL OF EVIDENCE: IV.